Anders Lindback is at the top of his game but caught in an awkward intersection of his passion for a sport and the business of sports.

“You can’t be sad when you get called up to the NHL because it’s opportunity,” the 29-year-old Milwaukee Admirals goaltender said, “but at the same time … yeah, it’s been odd.

“It always throws your rhythm off a little bit. I want to play games. I want to win games.”

For six years, Lindback shuttled between the National Hockey League and American Hockey League, but it took him returning to his native Sweden last season and playing losing hockey for a last-place team to get him performing at his best.

Now he is settled back in North America, a leader with the Admirals on and off the ice. He’s been a part-time member of the NHL Western Conference-leading Nashville Predators, too, having dressed for two games with the Admirals’ parent club.

But the key word there is “dressed,” not “played.”

With 22-year-old prospect Juuse Saros in the shadow of Pekka Rinne on the Predators roster, Nashville swaps him occasionally with Lindback to get Saros on the ice with the Admirals. So far, Saros has played four games for the Admirals while Lindback has watched from the Predators bench.

Another such swap could come this weekend, when Nashville (18-7-3) hosts Vegas (17-9-1) on Friday night and the Admirals (11-10-1) play at Manitoba (17-5-1-1) on Saturday and Sunday.

This is where the cheerful Lindback finds himself conflicted.

Who wouldn’t want to be in the NHL, especially after a season of playing in front of 3,800 people a night for a Swedish Hockey League team trying to avoid demotion? A temporary six-fold bump in pay is nice too.

But the lesson reinforced most for Lindback last year is that playing regularly is what has him stopping pucks at a career-best pace, winning games and being a part of NHL conversations again.

“I still think I have more to give,” Lindback said. “I think I can prove I have another level in me, and obviously I came back to North America to prove I could play in the NHL and for me it’s been a great thing being here in Milwaukee and going forward.

“Playing games gets me better. It’s about rhythm, but also you analyze situations differently, you get into that way of playing where you don’t spend as much time thinking of everything; you kind of tone it down and find the important things. Simplify the game.”

Veteran goaltender Anders Lindback spent last season playing in his native Sweden before returning to North America this year.(Photo: Dave Kallmann / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel)

Lindback’s North American career started in the Predators organization in 2010-’11, when he played 22 games with Nashville and four with Milwaukee.

Lindback has never played more than 24 games for a single AHL or NHL team in a season. His busiest year overall came in 2014-’15, when he went 10-18 in 33 games with Dallas (NHL), Texas (AHL) and Buffalo (NHL). He missed half of 2015-’16 with a torn Achilles before returning to Sweden when he found himself jobless last November.

Now Lindback is tied for the AHL lead in victories — in net for each of the Admirals’ 11 wins — and racking up stats that are among the top 12 in the league. His 2.43 goals-against average and 0.923 save percentage are as impressive as at any point in his career, and last month Lindback recorded his first shutout since Feb. 2014.

“Lindback, he’s had that consistency all year,” Admirals coach Dean Evason said. “I don’t know if he did anything or if there’s anything specific that’s allowed him to play as consistent as he has, but … it’s most likely his attitude.

"He comes every day to the rink with the right attitude. He obviously has the physical talent, but his attitude allows him to have success.”

The 6-foot-6 Lindback changed his off-season routine to work to make his movements more fluid. He has tried to build on the lessons learned through experience and taught by coaches on the 10 teams for which he has played over the past eight years.

Lindback is more relaxed, he says, not trying to do too much and instead letting the game come to him.

“Players are so good today, they see when I move a little — drop a knee or drop an elbow — they’re going to put it up there,” Lindback said. “It’s kind of like a quick chess game, a high-speed chess game. You really need to wait and kind of read where it’s going.

“You need to find balance in all aspects of the game. I think I can still work and develop certain sets of skills and the moving patterns, stick-handling.